Conceptual and Definitional Polysemy of the Term of Culture in Contemporary Social Sciences
Conceptual and Definitional Polysemy of the Term of Culture in Contemporary Social Sciences

Summary/Abstract: The aim of this paper is to present and analyse the conceptual anddefinitional polysemy of the term ‘culture’, as well as toemphasize some of the contemporary sociological andinterdisciplinary concepts, theories and understandings of culture.This is an important topic in social sciences, actualized bycontemporary theories of globalization, glocalization anddiscussions concerning global culture, contemporarytransnational anthropological approaches to culture, sociologicaltheories of modernity and modernization, “post-colonialdiscourse”, “strong program” in cultural sociology, contemporarypostmodern theoretical turns such as “cultural turn”, “spatialturn”, “complexity turn”. In this regard, various new scientificand theoretical concepts, notions and understandings of culture inthe “global age“ are developing. All of them have abandoned thetraditional definition of culture as unique, homogeneous, closed,static, territorialized, national, and now emphasize theunderstanding of culture as a diverse, hybrid, heterogeneous,open, fluid, dynamic, deterritorialized and transnational.However, in contemporary debates concerning multiculturalism,identity politics, politicization of culture, and cultural rights, it remains unclear, and it is still an open question as to way the term of culture is be defined, whether the traditional concept of culture is used, or whether culture is understood in a new way, which again updates its conceptual and definitional polysemy. In that sense, this paper points out the importance of defining the term of culture and the need to explain different usages and concepts of culture in contemporary social sciences.

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